Promise Israel Should Tell Obama

 

There has been much projecting on what President Obama might do to release his vengeance on Prime Minister Netanyahu and to hurt Israel permanently under International Relations. Israel should be wise and quietly relate to Administration officials that any drastic alteration from the agreed settlement reached through direct negotiations will be met with determination and resolve. Further information on what is meant by determination and resolve should be met that the degree to which such responses might take would be situationally dependent and would take actions measurable to any provocation or attack on the status-quo which the Administration was always so concerned about over the last eight years. Israel fully expects that said status-quo will continue and there will be no surprises or alterations placed on the balanced situation. This situational reactive desire will include any changes at the United Nations, The Hague or in any other international forum and not solely actions by the United States including lack of action allowing changes to occur. Should Israel find all things remain within the broader definition of the status-quo, then there would be no appreciable moves by Israel. Just believe that Israel is prepared to counter any move aimed at compromising Israel and the guarantees in place from before the election and including all expectations from promises and previous apparent intentions.

 

For the record, the rest of this editorial is purely the desired reactions BTC would hope have been communicated at least as strongly as above and potentially including some of what follows. One item which the world need understand is Israel will never allow any rescinding of our having annexed all of Jerusalem including the Old City, the Kotel and Plaza and the Temple Mount. These are all vital historic lands upon which there can be no debate, end of story. It is the intent of Israel to retail all of Area C which has been the intent from the very beginning of negotiations and Israel is adamant on this point. Area A will be permitted as Palestinian lands and agreements need be found to divide the lands in Area B such that each state has contiguous borders in the division in Judea and Samaria. All of these agreements depend on the Palestinians and the Arab nations recognize Israel as the home of the Jewish People and all reach a peace and agree that all hostilities will end. The situation is and has always been the Arab/Israeli conflict and not limited to just the Palestinians but the Arab and Muslim worlds. Any final agreement which falls short of this level of acceptance is a formula for eventual warfare and as such is unacceptable to Israel who desires peaceful and even beneficial relations with the other nations in the MENA nations (Middle East and North Africa – see map below). Israel will also retain the Golan Heights, particularly since there is no true Syrian government and the Islamic State, which is being enriched with Saudi Arabian funds and arms, could easily take these heights long enough to launch a severe attack upon Israelis residing in the Galilee. These same heights were previously used by Syrian snipers to practice their craft murdering farmers who were simply tending their fields and animals. That is another reason Israel must retain these high lands. Finally, the Jordan valley and overlooking heights will remain defended by the IDF as this is the first line for the defense of Israel. These minimal states need to be communicated through whatever channels used for official warnings and staunch positions. These are Israeli stances which have been presumably eroded but are being reestablished and former promises from San Remo through Article 80 of the United Nations Charter and the original mandate system. These promises need be realized and any compromise within the lands between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea will be permitted by the good graces of Israel and not through any external pressures or threats.

 

(MENA)
Middle East and North Africa
Including Turkey and Iran
With North Central Africa

 

Israel must take whatever defensive measures and precautions necessary to assure that should there be a parting vengeance shot from the White House in a manner which would be difficult or impossible for the Trump Administration to counter and return everything to the equilibrium which existed before any action by a parting President Obama, then Israel will have procedures and actions which would assure Israel’s rights and safety for the future. These are warnings and military planning with troops drilled and practiced for carrying out whatever is necessary to execute each of the responses to any of a complete series and span of potential attacks at the status-quo. Israel should be prepared to limit the Palestinian Authority (PA) to Area A and limited parts of Area B but none of Area C and if the Security Council were to pass an enforceable resolution, then Israel need act even if it causes a potential for a confrontation and be prepared to hold their ground and should world powers then demand Israel relent and it becomes apparent that an actual confrontation is in the making, then Israel will have little choice but to slowly pull from lands as necessary and also terminate all water, power and other services which the PA is behind on their payments. The world might be capable of forcing a settlement on Israel giving the PA everything that President Obama has continuously threatened to recognize, namely the pre Six Day War borders on Israel, there is absolutely no reason for Israel to power, water, feed and totally support such an open and immediate threat to her safety. There is no means other than invading an independent nation, Israel, and take control of the power grid, water systems and other utilities and even broadcast frequencies so as to provide free everything for the PA and force Israel to provide such support through invading a sovereign state, an act of war. That begs the question as to which nations would attempt an invasion just to enact such a spiteful assault by Barack Hussein Obama as he leaves office. One would hope none of the main powers would enforce such but Israel should be prepared for even the most unlikely of situations, the world backing a temper tantrum. Israel actually could annex all of Judea and Samaria followed by deportation of every officer from the PA and all of the security personnel, particularly the ones with terror ties which include the majority of the police and security personnel. This must be one possible solution which should be reserved only should President Obama attempt to give all of Judea and Samaria to the PA as a gift and claim the United States recognizes their invented nation. Such cannot be permitted to stand as within days either Hamas or Islamic State would take possession of the lands which then would allow them to pose a direct threat to Tel Aviv, Ben Gurion International Airport and the majority of infrastructure, business and residential neighborhoods, a completely untenable situation. This is the threat and potential situation facing Israel and why the leadership must make any action by President Obama have consequences which are spelled out in advance such that there can be no surprise or claim that the reaction was not anticipated. The real aim is to preserve the status-quo such that the system can continue for as long as the world demands that terrorists of the PA must be coddled as if they actually cared for the people residing under their corrupt rule. The day will come, possibly soon, when the people living under the PA will demand real leadership and an end to their impoverished state directly due to the thieving of their leadership. On that day the Israelis will know that the Palestinian people are ready to have peace and a future for their children and themselves.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Coming of Obama’s Parting Shot @ Israel

 

President Obama, contrary to many leftist American Jews’ commentaries and letters to editors, has a quite high animosity towards Israel which has been evident from his Cairo speech onward. We will grant that we have been experiencing a calmed and quieted President Obama concerning Israel over the summer. That changed this week on the slightest of provocations. Israel announced their intention to continue with a previously announced building of homes in the Jewish community of Shiloh. These homes are being built in order to provide the families whose homes in a nearby community are to be destroyed in response to President Obama and the State Department efforts. Apparently President Obama and the State department desired these Jews be forced from beyond the 1949 Armistice line, the Green Line, and within the indefensible pre June 1967 borders. By the way, the belief that the pre June 1967 borders, the Green Line, being indefensible is not just the Israeli government’s belief but has been the position of numerous American Presidents, Secretary of States, Defense Secretaries and members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Pentagon and other Generals. Should Israel ever be forced back within those previous borders the midsection of the country in and around Tel Aviv will be a mere nine miles. Yes, Israel would be pushed into a border with her midsection only nine miles wide which, just for reference, is less than half the width of Washington, D.C. Yet there are rumors that President Obama is planning a last ditch ambush against Israel to punish Netanyahu and Israel for not making his Nobel Peace Prize valid and of having been awarded with valid foresight. The editorials and other commentaries criticizing the Nobel Committee for getting carried away over the election of the first President of the United States of color in their rush to award President Obama with the Nobel Peace Prize had even some within the Nobel Central Committee suggesting that the award be negated in the view of the actual record of President Obama’s Administration. Perhaps this might be President Obama’s effort to validate his being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize on the backs of the safety and possible future of Israel and her people.

 

 

Some have questioned what might be the real harm behind such a United Nations passing of such a resolution. There have been almost countless United Nations General Assembly Resolution and official denunciations from the Human Rights Council against Israel and Israel has survived them all quite nicely even to include the 1975 Zionism as racism General Assembly Resolution which was finally repealed some sixteen years later. Would another meaningless and unenforceable United Nations General Assembly generated piece of paper actually have any deleterious effects on Israel and the day to day life of the average Israeli? Well, that depends on whether what President Obama is intending to pursue is simply a harmless General Assembly Resolution or whether he is intent on something with more weight and potentially even some teeth to the motion. Granted, much of what might be accomplished at the United Nations, especially in the General Assembly where anything anti-Israel has a sort of built in guarantee of passage, would not be all that threatening but that is not what we expect from what we have been capable of gathering and assume from our efforts.

 

President Obama has had the vision of himself as the man who ultimately ended the Israeli-Palestinian Arab conflict and he has been determined since his very first day in the White House when he made his very first official phone call from the Oval Office to Mahmoud Abbas even before calling any actual head of state. There have been unconfirmed rumors about the content of that phone call which White House official commentary has passed off as being cordial but nothing of substance nor should any importance be placed in the call without proof that there were any guarantees or promises of intent communicated. Such a disclaimer reeks of something worth concealing being the reality and we have suspected that President Obama, filled with the grand visions of himself as some great communicator and a special individual with privilege and promise greater than his predecessors did in fact give guarantees to Mahmoud Abbas that he would press forward and bring about the Palestinian State which the President himself believed in his heart was the right and proper thing that was on the right side of history, and we all know President Obama’s sense of importance on things he perceives to be on the right side of history, whether that be the real side or not being unimportant. President Obama has criticized Vladimir Putin for being on the wrong side of history expecting that such a criticism would force President Putin to alter his plans and prevent him from such dangerous actions which would fall on the wrong side of history such as invading the Ukraine or interfering in President Obama’s plans in Syria. This right side of history theme plays a large part in President Obama’s views of the world and he also appears to believe that he has this special ability to judge what is and is not on the right side of history, and a Palestinian State is on his perceived right side of history as has been the Iran Nuclear Deal while Prime Minister Netanyahu is on the wrong side of History.

 

It is our conjecture that President Obama is not planning on a General Assembly Resolution calling for the formation of a Palestinian State with the Green Line as its borders and that all Israeli towns and other structures and settlements are merely unhelpful and undesired as they are preventing the settlement of the conflict. This is mere restating of what he and others have claimed in ever increasing volume and irascibility. President Obama has not given up on settling the conflict in what he views as the correct and properly fair manner which is, of course, the right side of history. As he sees history, Israel was illegally formed and has stolen Palestinian Arab lands as the Jews are a people of ill will; evil, dark hearts who have aggressively strode to steal ever more Arab Palestinian homeland and probably never should have been given the land for their state in 1948 or ever and do not deserve a nation of their own as they are to be punished to roam the world living at the kindness of others whom they repay with spite and poisoning their host’s lands and are accursed by Heaven and are the spawn of Satan. Simply stated, he agreed with every sermon condemning the Jews he ever heard in the Reverend Wright’s Mosque disguised as a church and was a friend and believer with Edward Said, Louis Farrakhan and Rashid Ismail Khalidi. These men were among the fomenters of President Obama’s feud with Israel and desire to destroy Israel through whatever means he was able and he sees that opportunity slipping from his grasp and will take whatever measures he feels will be effective in setting in motion the eventual destruction of Israel and by doing so rid the world of the Jew.

 

So what is it we fear that President Obama will be pursuing and at what point in his remaining weeks should his actions be expected. President Obama cannot act before the election and will remain mute while he will have others deny, deny, deny and deny any accusations no matter what evidence may be presented and will call on some of his “Jewish” friends to defend him such as the leaders of J-Street and friends from academia who share his distaste for Israel. Once the election has passed and the Christmas “Winter” break approaches and congress is ready to run for the hills, or from the Hill, he will arrange for a quiet, low key and unpublicized meeting of the Security Council where only those nations desired will be formally invited with the rest receiving the information of the meeting the night before. President Obama will then have presented a Resolution recognizing the State of Palestine with the Green Line as its borders and East Jerusalem as its Capital City. Where we believe he will actually go so far as to make the proposal a Chapter Seven Resolution which is enforceable by the use of military intervention if any side does not comply appropriately and within a reasonable period of time, he may still be persuaded to simply settle for a Chapter Six Resolution which is a strong and insistent demand which will be accepted by the vast majority of nations, does not allow for the use of military force to enforce the resolution, just economic and other methods including removing embassies and ambassadors, economic sanctions, diplomatic pressures and anything else as long as it remains short of military intervention. The reason he might not call for a Chapter Seven is should Donald Trump have won the election he knows that there would be little if any chance that his resolution no matter its wording would be enforced by the United States which pretty much means it would not be enforced. But should Hillary have won the election, President Obama would be free to go for all the marbles knowing that at worst a President Hillary Clinton would do little if anything to prevent military enforcement and would pretend her hands were tied and implement heavy political and economic pressures including an end to all aid to Israel and perhaps arming Arab forces and provide them with protective air support in forcing Israel to comply with President Obama’s final efforts. This could be done even against the will of Congress providing the efforts did not go beyond the Presidential prerogative for use of force. Going further could bring on charges of impeachment but should there be sufficient Democrat membership in congress, President Hillary Clinton could even ignore all limitations knowing she was safe from being fully impeached by both houses such that even if she were charged she would not be convicted.

 

As far as what could prevent President Obama from taking such actions, the answer is unfortunately, “Nothing.” Should he decide that such would establish for him his rightful place in history, on the right side of history as he sees it, then he will likely do as he sees fit. The minimum would be a simple General Assembly Resolution which would be next to meaningless but still fulfill his promises to see to the recognition of statehood for the Palestinians even despite such an action having no teeth. Such an effort would take little extra action as such a proposed Resolution, as stated before, would breeze through the General Assembly and could be accomplished even if he waited until after the New Year as he has the first three weeks before the inauguration to do as he feels proper and Congress does not return until the week of the inauguration and does not convene until after the inauguration. Anything done in January would be performed without any interference from Congress or ratification from Congress, of course. Congress is unlikely to approve of whatever moves President Obama chooses but that would have little effect on the General Assembly as they have often thumbed their noses at the United States Congress and also the President when it suited their mood of the moment. Any Security Council Resolution would eventually require the confirmation as if a treaty by Congress which would present problems for the United States supporting the action of the American President, even if a ‘lame duck’ in his final moments. Should the Resolution be a Chapter Seven Security Council Resolution then it would most definitively require Congressional ratification just as if it were a treaty, something the Senate would be unlikely to approve. As for what effect that would have on the United Nations Security Council actions is a wholly different kettle of fish. Finally, there is also the possibility that the Security Council Resolution could be introduced by a nation other than the United States and in order to avoid any fallout President Obama could simply have the United States abstain and not work against the resolution knowing that by doing such he would be granting the effort a tacit approval which would influence the other permanent members of the Security Council to at worst also abstain thus allowing it to very probably pass as some of the other members would still support such a measure. There is one other possibility, that of one of the other permanent members using their veto thus ending the resolution and if it were a Chapter Seven Resolution we are willing to bet that is exactly what would be the case. The nations most likely to use their veto might surprise many but we would expect either China or Russia to be the veto wielding savior. So, imagine an American President attempting to use the Security Council of the United Nations to have the world force Israel to surrender all lands gained in the 1967 Six Day War and retreat behind the Green Line and the Russians or the Chinese vetoing the Resolution foiling the efforts of the President of the United States. That would be the ultimate embarrassment and there could be no more fitting manner in which to provide President Obama with the award of being consistently on the wrong side of history in his entire eight years as President.

 

As far as counting on anything to counter any actions intended by President Obama as he got on average three-quarters of the Jewish vote in his two elections if not higher. About the only Jews who can be definitively counted upon to raise the roof are the ZOA (Zionist Organization of America) who will be left talking while the phone has been secured under a cushion and the aide has left the room. There is nothing that the American Jews would even be willing to do as there will be at least as high a percentage voting for Hillary Clinton as voted for President Obama and most of the rest are represented by the ZOA or are Orthodox Jews likely residing in the New York greater metropolitan area and thus their votes even ifnot for Hillary will make little if any difference unless the all but unthinkable happens and New York State becomes a close race and Trump actually has even the slightest of hopes. That is unlikely but we can hope.

 

So what can be done and is it possible? What can be done is risk it all and have Prime Minister Netanyahu call the American Amabassador to his office, have the Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations call the American Ambassador to his office, have the Israeli Ambaddador to the United States call the Secretary of State for an urgent meeting, and if refused, then leave a letter at the White House addressed to the President and hand delivered all with a single message. Should President Obama use the Security Council for any resolution establishing a Palestinian State or declaring the 1949 Armistice Lines as a recognized border, Israel will take action. These lines are also called the Green Line, the one President Obama misnames as the 1967 lines, as they were not established in 1967 but were corrected in 1967. The action Israel would take should the United States seek official recognition of such as a border by the Security Council, would be to establish the Jordan River as the border as it is legally under all international laws including at least one treaty ratified by the United States when stating and signing on to agreements that the San Remo Conference was a valid document and the Treaty of Sèvres and all others based on San Remo are valid in signifying the borders for the Jewish State.

 

This establishment of the proper and legal borders will not permit a single Palestinian to become a citizen immediately and will establish the officers, leaders and security force officers and all of the special forces as personna non grata in Israel and provide them with two weeks to find new living arrangements. All of the Palestinian Security Forces will have forty eight hours to turn in their weapons and each will be reviewed and may potentially be hired for the new police force under Israeli police command. Some may even be granted their former rank and even placed in command positions if they check to have no connections to terrorist entities past or present. Finally, the citizens of the Palestinian Authority will be permitted to remain and will continue to have their businesses, their homes, their jobs if they work for an Israeli owned company, and some employees if requested by companies which relocated within Israel due to the BDS boycotts may be granted work entry permits to return to their former positions should the company so request. After a year there will be decision made as to whether and the procedure that interested Arabs formerly under the Palestinian Authority government will be permitted to start the procedures for Israeli citizenship. Within six months of that date there will be free and open election in the former areas of the Palestinian Authority under Israeli supervision. Former Palestinian Authority citizens will be granted local voting rights in their areas but should they move they will be required to seek Israeli citizenship once a procedure is established before being granted the vote. As the Palestinian Authority citizens will initially be considered alien residents, they will not have rights to vote in Israeli general elections as that will remain reserved for Israeli citizens, including any of the Palestinian Authority Arabs who gain such citizenship. Israel will immediately take over the police and security functions and all radio and television and cable networked shows and start a review to see if they meet with Israeli broadcast regulations and laws before being permitted back on the air. Other problems will be handled as they present themselves and any terrorist activity will be punished by immediate repatriation to their country of origin or any nation they might choose who will accept them even to include the United States.

 

An example might be the Palestinian Authority Registrar for the National Palestinian Committee for Education, Culture and Science who was not only not from the Israeli area but his name tells his nationality as he is from Sudan as the rest of Murad Al-Sudani clan originated. He is the Secretary General as listed on their official site here about half way down the page. He is far from the only officer or person of importance as most of the higher ranking persons, Yasser Arafat and Mahmoud Abbas amongst them, are of foreign origins, another of the dirty little secrets which are constantly denied and all proof ignored by the rest of the world as their desired future lies with an Arab extinguishing of Israel. That alone should have been enough reason for the PLO, Hamas, Islamic Jihad and their gangs be removed and law and order replace the kleptocrats stealing the people blind and sent packing giving peace and real opportunity returned to the decent people of the West Bank and Gaza, and there are a number of decent people who are mostly scared to death and must watch their every utterrance. They deserve better and a fair opportunity for a productive life.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Blessings We Have Found in Israel

 

Israel gets some bad public relations if one depends on the news, editorials, talk radio and just about any mass media, even movies and other entertainment. Living in Israel very quickly dispels all the lies. Are there a few choice people who might make one take a less than superb view, but such are rare and even they warm with time. Needless to say, not knowing or speaking the language causes some difficulties but there is almost always somebody there to lend a translating hand. There was the time we were at a McDonalds and the woman at the counter spoke no English and two what had to be young High School age girls came in and realizing the communication problem immediately became our translators without being asked. Generally there are those who willingly offer to give directions to whatever place you need to find in ten minutes to make the appointment and it is your first time in the city and you got off the bus where you thought was the closest stop. That time we only missed by one or two stops and had to walk about a mile or so, you get used to walking in Israel because so much living is city center style European life, an initial system shock after life in the outer suburbs in the United States.

 

Our friends, acquaintances and relatives are quite surprised when we relate the ease and general atmosphere in Israel. When we tell them that we have found Israel more accommodating and generally having a softer and more easy and comforting nature they tend to express great surprise. One might expect that in Israel life would have an edge on it with the constant threats from virtually any direction and the added unpleasant surprise with the Iranian nuclear threat and President Obama and his team’s animosities and threats thrown at Israel but they would be quite wrong. Probably the best description we could give as a true barometer of Israel and Israelis would be to take everything ever attributed to Israel and her people by the United Nations General Assembly and the United Nations Human Rights Commission or virtually any other United Nations agency etcetera and take it all and place the initials of the United Nations in front of them but in small letters and then read the entirety as one word. An easy example would be if some United Nations commission claimed Israelis harbored a genocidal hatred then all one need do is take the two words and place the letter un in front giving you ungenocidal and unhatred and you would produce an honest appraisal. Sure it would take ignoring your spellcheck and do some translations where ungenocidal would become accepting of others people who are different and unhatred would become lovers making the entire accusation translate into accepting and caring for peoples who differ from Jews and accepting, caring and considerate of people who are of any other stereotypical, racial, religious or nationality different from Israeli or Jewish. A closer inspection of Israeli actions around the world will better exemplify this example.

 

When Haiti was struck by that devastating earthquake, the Israelis were amongst the first to have responders on the ground evaluating any special needs. Israel had the first field hospital which was equipped with X-ray equipment, a gynecological unit, a neonatal unit, burn center, surgical rooms, prosthetics and physical therapy, emergency room, and virtually every department and specialists which was on the ground and set up within six days of the earthquake. This hospital remained on the ground even after the search and rescue units had stood down. Israel also opened clinics in areas where urgent care not requiring the abilities of a full hospital were present and when the Israelis left Haiti a number of these clinics remained completely equipped with diagnostic, monitoring and other equipment and Israel had trained people in the area such as orphanage, school or other personnel who would be capable of offering care after the Israelis had left.

 

When Typhoon Haiyan spread destruction throughout much of the Philippines, Israel arrived with an one-hundred-forty-eight person team, including search, rescue and medical services and a fully functioning field hospital with one-hundred tons of aid. Making rescue and aid assistance even more difficult was when the typhoon struck, the region was still reeling from the Bohol earthquake in October before. One of the more interesting reports on the Israeli presence at the time was on television news where an on the scenes reporter had been directed to a small village not on one of the main Islands by the Philippine government when she requested assistance in reaching the “most remote village” to report on how they were coping with the aftermath of the storm. Imagine her surprise to find a clinic operated by Israelis already set up and operating while training the local villagers on how to treat people for emergency aid and familiarizing them with the equipment which the Israelis would leave behind as well as the clinic itself with one Israeli aid worker to remain behind and work for the next six months or so with the villagers to assure that they have received whatever training might arise.

 

When Nepal recently had their massive earthquake, once again Israel was amongst the first to respond and the operation was much like the one in Haiti with one exception which was remarkable; Israel took care to the most remote of places, some of which had rarely if ever seen support even from the Nepalese government where Israel set up satellite care units often referred to as clinic in a backpack, though we would hate to have to carry such a backpack, they are quite heavy (pictured below). These remote aid clinics provided urgent and critical care close to the, and often on the, mountain slopes treating climbers and vacation goers as well as native Nepalese citizens. They also operated as a remote triage for when victims were stabilized and given what treatment was available at the clinic and once the patients were stabilized for transport having them taken to the main Israeli or other field hospital.

 

 

The Israeli and Nepalese medical staff who operated the IsraAID mobile clinic in the village of Tar, ten hours northeast of Kathmandu. (Photo credit: Melanie Lidman/Times of Israel)

 

 

Israel has sent aid groups to other areas struck by natural calamities with teams having gone to Japan after their earthquake and tsunami disaster, Myanmar after the tsunami, Turkey after they suffered an earthquake and offered assistance to the United States after hurricane Katrina swamped New Orleans and destroyed entire fishing towns along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, and reportedly one of a very remote few to offer assistance to the United States. When one considers the Save a Child’s Heart program and how it saves children of all ages who have debilitating if not life-threatening heart problems as well as setting up entire departments in hospitals around the world and training their staff and physicians on how to diagnose and treat these children including training the heart surgeons on how to perform these sensitive and vital surgeries, Israel leaves all the equipment the staff was trained on with the hospital.

 

And the Israelis you meet, see, work with and just generally run across are some of the most patient people and really do try to help in their own manner. They may sometimes have difficulty in expressing things in English but many are actually happy and anxious to use their English and respond well when one states the words in the correct syntax as that is important to them. Sentence structure in Hebrew is different than in English and thus literal word for word translations quite often makes for what at first one takes as Yoda speak from Star Wars, perhaps it was direct translation of Hebrew to English that was the basic transference used to make Yoda syntax. Our Hebrew is embarrassingly inadequate to even make a scheduled appointment and get the day of the week correct not to mention the time as some places use a twenty-four hour clock which reminds all of military times.

 

Then there is a tight knit group of what are referred to as Anglos, basically English speakers, and we have events, trips, sightseeing, Torah, Talmud and Bible classes for men and women and we have found our level of social activities is vastly more active and on a level of friendliness equal to our best of times and friends back in the United States. Another thing which leads to such is that Israel is a rather small nation, approximately the size of New Jersey, though that is misleading as the southern two-fifths, or forty-percent, of Israel is made up of the Negev Desert which is rather sparsely populated. Where New Jersey has a population of nine-million, Israel’s population is just over eight-million. Of course there are some groups who pretty much stick to their own group of like-minded and religious viewpoints such as the Haredi. In much of Israel where there is a mix of Arab and Jewish populations there is no evident difference in the treatment and the interactions are natural and as normal as humanly possible. In the area we reside there are Arab and Muslim stores and employees in larger stores or other places of employment are seamless as to their fitting into the society as a whole. At the regional hospital there are Muslim and Arab nurses, physicians, technicians and all positions and everything functions, as we said, seamlessly. The street signs are all written in Hebrew, Arabic, and English with some towns sporting French or Spanish or Russian, though we have yet to see one which had more than four languages and usually just the three required languages. What is always amusing is when a store has its name actually an English name but the letters on their sign is in Hebrew. What gets confusing is that when you read some of these signs you try to think what the prefixes and suffixes are as Hebrew has many words result only in a letter prefix or suffix. Some examples of prefixes are the ‘v’ which means ‘and’ along with an ‘h’ which means ‘the’ while the suffixes often give one the gender of the word as well as if it is singular or plural or includes the speaker or listener in the plural group and so on. Over half of learning Hebrew are the prefixes and the gender and singular versus plural of the words. Someday we will get a reliable translation program for our phones, or should we call them what the phones have become, life assistants and general applications from pictures to recordings, getting e-mail, surf the Web, record our every move and change of mood on Facebook, well, not quite, and most important movie or still camera and recorder.

 

Basically, virtually everything UNcomplimentary about Israel are UNtrue. Contrary to popular belief they are not contrarians. Israelis are like all peoples, there are the great, the good and the we wish they were nicer types. Many fall all over themselves attempting to make our lives as stress free as possible which had to be stressing on them. Of course it might be that as the ancient Hebrew scholars made a point of hammering into our stories and writings, people will only treat you as well as you treat them and life can be like a mirror to one’s soul which is revealed by ones actions when it appears nobody is watching, because, as we are taught in Judaism and is likely taught though with a slight difference, there is always somebody watching us from on High and nothing escapes that view as our innermost thoughts to our most expressed emotions. We can also count that such observations tell whether we’ve been bad or good, so be good for goodness sake. Still, there is something else which permeates through the society at large. There is an air of optimism and hopefulness. You feel a vigor for living life and finding meanings where other places simply ignore and accept things as is. In Israel there is this striving to be better as a people and as individuals. There is also a level of acceptance which makes one more comfortable simply being themselves as all will be just fine in the end. There are more young children than we were used to in the United States. This too adds to the optimism as a society with declining populations is what is destroying Europe right before our eyes. They are dancing their last dance in Europe and if things continue as has been the scenario we in Israel will become all the more isolated and an Island of freedom and democracy in a sea of misfortune. There is still hope for Europe but only if they turn their ship of state around and rediscover what gave them the impetus to live life to the fullest and explore the world, that spark of life which made passing their ideas and ideals on to the next generation, something difficult to do when there are so few children born to the indigenous Europeans. Israel will only grow stronger as the Jews of Europe make their final decision and that plague may soon prove to be a prophesy for the United States though that need not be their future written in stone. The United States has a far better opportunity to reverse the slipping trend before the slope becomes too steep and wet for any traction and down becomes the only direction. We are both glad we have come to Israel and Israel has proven to be a wellspring of optimism and life, a future of light and enlightenment, more than a completion as it is an opportunity to grow with such splendor and a kaleidoscope of choices each colored so vividly and vibrant. It is really hope eternal or as close as we have seen on Earth. It is great to be at home, the home which was destined and a good, no, great home it is and will grow from there. Needless to say, but we do not expect the United Nations to understand as they are the people of ‘UN’ and that sums them up in total.

 

Beyond the Cusp